Chrome Blows Past FireFox

It’s official, Chrome has passed FireFox and is now the number 2 browser world wide.

It has been a year since my last Browser Wars report and at that time I predicted the continued climb of Chrome, the fall of FireFox, and the steady fade of Internet explorer. Today that prediction has come true. Google Chrome has overtaken FireFox as the number 2 browser in the world.

Independent testing group, StatCounter has released the graph below showing browser usage from November 2009 to November 2011. The graph shows Google Chrome with 25.69% and Firefox with 25.23% of market share.

The figures for the UK show Chrome with an even stronger lead at 24.82% of market share and Firefox at 20.56%.

StatCounter CEO Aodhan Cullen reports that the stats are based on actual usage and not simply download figures. The graph is an aggregate of data collected from a sampling of the StatCounter network totaling over 3 million websites with 15 billion page views per month.

I installed Chrome when it first became available but my experience with Chrome was not “love at first sight”. The minimal appearance of chrome took some getting used to but its performance was remarkable. It was just plain fast, I was hooked.

Regular updates and a growing list of extensions have helped it grow quickly when compared to the other browsers. Chrome is, after all, the newcomer when compared to IE and Firefox.

In previous articles I used figures and graphs from NETMARKETSHARE. Their figures are not out for the month of November but the trend is obvious when looking at their latest graph. Check it out below.

The next year should see exciting changes in the Browser Wars. Internet Explorer continues to hold the first position but I see a future where Chrome will challenge Internet Explorer for first place. I also have to wonder if there will be any new entrants into the wars.

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22 thoughts on “Chrome Blows Past FireFox”

I have avoided using I.E. since 2007, and depend on Chrome, Firefox and Opera.

If the website will not open in Chrome, Firefox, or Opera then the developers or company do not need my business.

I was under the impression, that I.E. had dropped below the 45% usage mark, but I guess it would be near impossible to know and understand web browser use, without a scan of computers to see the cookie counts, along with the website hits. So this information of web browser use may only be a educated guess at best.

I may belong to a strange breed, but I feel most comfortable with the ONLY legitimate heir of the venerable NETSCAPE NAVIGATOR, and that’s a cousin of Firefox: the notable (Mozilla) SEAMONKEY, which ought not to be ignored.

Hi All 🙂
I am a Chrome user now for close to 2 years and I have never had any issues. Just like you Shogan I was hooked on the very fast resposne times.
Adding book marks is just a click away and as I am an android user integrates well with my smart phone.
Apple=restriction Google=freedom

even though I do use firefox a lot there is one thing I don’t like about firefox, and that is firefox is very slow about closing sometimes. in fact, I think I have it closed, and try to re open it for another site, and it tells me I need to close firefox before opening it again.
I have seen some improvements in chrome, and am really considering it as my main browser. IE? I have had a few too many problems with it, but still use it as a back burner browser.

Linda, in the past I’ve had issues opening multiple instances of Chrome but not recently.

There should be no problem using different email addresses…. Maybe you could try using different User Accounts and Log Ons for Windows. It’s easy enough to switch users while in Windows and it may end the conflict.

I’ve been a FF fan since FF3. I’m now using FF8 except for a couple of Web sites that only operate in IE9 for me: Army Together We Served and Jacquie Lawson Web cards. Can anyone tell me why I can’t view sites like those on FF8? I’m also wary of FF9 until it comes out of Beta. . . .

I recently have been having problems with Chrome. My husband & I have separate accounts on our computer. Sometimes, when one of us signs in to Chrome, the other can’t, other times, it won’t load anything for either of us. I’ve uninstalled & reinstalled several times. Any suggestions? I really like it and hate to change.

I think you’re out of date, EDF. Chrome doesn’t have a “Bookmarks” or “Favorite” button, but you can pull up the Bookmarks Bar simply by clicking the Wrench, selecting Bookmarks, and then Bookmarks Bar. It will stay until you choose to remove it again. Bookmarks will appear in the order you add them (by clicking the little Star on the right side of the address/search bar), but you can rearrange them by simply dragging & dropping to the desired order.

Bruce, that could be. I could not discover if the sampling included phones and tablets or not. That might explain some of the difference between StatCounter and NetMarketShare. I’ll keep searching for that answer.

I switched to Chrome about 2 months ago, I keep trying the new versions of Firefox, but the reason I changed still stands. I switched because starting with Ver. 6 Firefox would not play any videos, upgrading flash didn’t help.
Chrome however plays every video I throw at it!
Firefox now in Ver. 8 still doesn’t play any video

I like Firefox. Chrome is okay but I see no reason to change. I don’t use a “smart phone” and never will so it really makes no difference to me in that arena. If any browser developer wants to send me money…

Well a lot of it would of course have to do with the number of android tablets and smart phones which account for the largest share of the market. When you consider the fact that every android device comes with chrome browser as default and the great majority of people do not change default settings that is one hell of a lot of web browsers.

That is the only place I use chrome, and would use firefox mobile if my phone supported it. 😉